THE campaign for a national identity card gathered momentum yesterday when the Nationals joined calls for a serious debate.

Nationals Senate leader Ron Boswell, a fierce opponent of the Australia Card proposal 20 years ago, said yesterday that times had changed and an ID card should be reconsidered.

Senator Boswell said that although his party had campaigned against the Hawke government's 1987 proposal, the London and Bali bombings last year were reason enough for the issue to be looked at again.

"We're now prepared to look at any proposals that are put up for a national identity card," Senator Boswell said.

"We would still need some convincing, but the Nationals' door isn't closed to a national identity card scheme."

Attorney-General Philip Ruddock will present the findings of a departmental review of the new Australia Card proposal to federal cabinet by the end of March. John Howard ordered the review of the ID card issue in the wake of the London terrorist bombings last July.

Write a letter to your local MP and the Federal ministers pushing for this and tell them that you oppose it because:

1. It won't affect terrorism. This kind of thing is always circumvented.
2. It is attack on privacy and freedom of speech.
3. It will cost the Australian taxpayer heaps and offer little benefit.

Things like this will destroy the freedom of speech that allows forums like SF to exist. If this site was hosted in Australia it would be shut down. It would also allow the government to mark people who posted on SF and screw them over. This is first step to the government telling you what you have to think.

ID cards are one of the standard tools of an oppressive, communistic state.

ID cards will have no effect on violent crime rates or prevent terrorist attacks.

The ID cards MIGHT make things a little more difficult for illegal aliens, but not much. For example, it is well known around Sydney that photo ID's for taxi drivers are often used by more than one person. This allows many people to drive a cab with only one lot of tax being paid.

An ID card is quite unnecessary given that Tax Fie Numbers perform a similar function (identify a particular individual). A drivers license and TFN provide ample proof of identity, along with other details about the person.

Introducing a compulsory ID card will:

1) raise revenue for the government -(yearly(?) fee, change of details, etc) at our expense (...yet another tax)

2) create yet another market for cheap chinese copies.

3) create an "excuse" for people to be arrested (Not produce Identity Card upon demand by "authorised officer").

While this may be ideal for those who want us to live in a totalitarian police state, it does nothing for those who want just to live in peace and be left alone.

It is interesting to note (over the past few years) how the introduction of "harsher laws", "gun control", and a thousand other little oddball ideas have done NOTHING to stem the tide of crime which is slowly and surely encircling middle-class Aussies.
Taxes just keep rising as more money is rorted out of taxpayers to fund these wonderful communist inspired schemes.

What a sad situation, honest taxpayers and citizens being made to suffer because bad government policy allows mongrels into our country.

All this, just so a small elite circle can get their hands on cheap and nasty labour for their factories in the name of "economic growth".

I won't be expecting a referrendum on this issue, it's just not the way we do things around here anymore....

s4t4n, you are right on the money. Keep this discussion coming out on this forum and others, for all of our sakes! With the media the way it is, and this government desperate to get control of the internet and the minds of Australian people, we need to keep these forums full of intelligent, realistic, opposing views!

It's not just that there are many other forms of id that we already carry - it's that they are all going to be combined into this one form of id. Forget Medicare cards, your 18+ card, Drivers Licence etc., you might even well say goodbye to your bank/credit cards - this is the reality that is around the corner. As SouthWesterner said, we will be told it is for "our benefit", thought the reality is tracking citizens and control.

Meanwhile we are told we live in a "free country", hell, we even go to war to defend "our freedoms" - whatever the hell they are.

Boswell is a grub of the lowest order.
He is a Zionist, a race mixer and was the main figure in the campaign against Pauline Hanson in Queensland.
I hope that he gets prostate cancer and dies screaming.